by Mark Gimenez
‘Would you take one of me and the professor?’
Sam came around the counter and stood next to Book. Nadine took their photo and handed the camera back to Sam. He went over to his desk, put the camera down, and picked up a book.
‘Would you sign my book? I mean, your book?’
Book autographed the title page.
‘I read that article about you in the New York Times,’ Sam said. ‘How people write you letters asking for help and you go off on these adventures, crusades they called them … photo didn’t do you justice.’
Book decided to take Sam Walker into his confidence.
‘Sam, can I trust you?’
Sam leaned in a bit.
‘Sure, Professor.’
‘Nathan Jones wrote me one of those letters.’
Book pulled out Nathan’s letter and handed it to Sam. He looked at both sides of the envelope then removed the letter and read it. His expression turned somber. He slowly folded the letter, put it back inside the envelope, and handed it back to Book, almost as if he didn’t want it in his possession.
‘Noticed the postmark,’ Sam said. ‘Same day he died. Another coincidence.’
Book nodded.
‘So you came to Marfa because he wrote this letter, only to find him dead. Said someone followed him home, said his wife was scared. Might make a man suspicious.’
‘It might.’
‘You seen his proof?’
‘Not yet.’
‘That’d be a big story, fracking contaminating the water. Hope it’s not true.’
‘Because of the water?’
‘Because something like that could blow this town apart.’
‘Or get someone killed.’
‘Might could.’
Sam studied Book a long moment.
‘Professor, mind if I ask you something?’
‘Shoot.’
‘Why do you care so much about Nathan Jones?’
‘I owe him.’
Sam nodded slowly. ‘Sheriff said his death was an accident.’
‘You trust him?’
‘Brady Munn? He’s as honest as the desert.’
‘Know who Nathan’s client might be?’
Sam tapped the image of a big bald man in the funeral photo.
‘Gotta be Billy Bob Barnett. Why else would he be at a lawyer’s funeral? Biggest fracking guy in the Big Bend. Rolled into town five years back from Odessa. Office is just down the street, oil rig on the roof, can’t miss it.’
‘I didn’t. So Mr. Barnett is an important person in town?’
‘You could say that. Twice.’
‘Why?’
‘Because he’s got what Marfa’s never had and everyone wants: jobs. Before he came to town, we had damn near twenty-five percent unemployment. Now it’s damn near zero. We’re still a poor county, just not as poor. Which makes you feel rich, after you’ve been so poor for so long.’
‘So tell me about Marfa.’
Book had shared information with Sam Walker, and now Sam wanted to share with Book. Most lawyers view every conversation as an opportunity to practice their interrogation of a hostile witness; but Book had learned a skill most lawyers never learn: to listen to other people. Sam stepped to the wall and pointed at an old black-and-white photo. The courthouse towered over the town.
‘That was Marfa back in the late eighteen-hundreds, only about eight hundred residents. Then they built the courthouse, and we became the county seat. Town started to grow. Government stationed the cavalry here during the Mexican Revolution—they called it Camp Marfa until they changed the name to Fort D. A. Russell. By nineteen thirty, we had almost four thousand residents.’
Sam tapped a framed photograph that showed cavalry soldiers in formation on horseback.
‘That’s the way the fort looked back then. During World War Two, the government built a POW camp out there, brought in a few hundred German prisoners from Rommel’s Afrika Korps. Geneva Convention says prisoners are supposed to be detained in the same climate they were captured in, so it was desert to desert for them. Not sure those Germans might not have opted for California or Colorado if given the choice, but they got Marfa. Apparently they were well behaved, didn’t try to escape. Grew vegetables in a garden and painted murals on their barracks, old Building Ninety-Eight. You can go look at it. And we had the Marfa Army Air Field east of town, brought pilots in for flight training. Can’t see much from the highway, but go on that Google Earth, you can still see the runways. That was our peak time, over five thousand folks lived here.’
‘What happened?’
‘We won the war. The army closed up shop, and the Germans went home. Shut down the fort, except for the part used by the Border Patrol to stop bootleg coming across the border. Beer and whiskey, seems kind of quaint now, doesn’t it, compared to cocaine and heroin?’
He worked the toothpick.
‘And then the rain stopped. Seven years it didn’t rain, in the fifties. The great drought. Destroyed cattle ranching and the local economy, such as it was. Old-timers had to sell the herds then the land. Only break from the suffering was when Giant came to town. I was fifteen back then. Exciting time. They hired locals for extras, money people damn sure needed. My folks were in the barbecue scene, when Rock brought Liz home to Texas. Cast mingled with the locals between shots, nights at the Paisano—I watched the dailies in the ballroom every night, me and the rest of Marfa. I thought Jimmy Dean was about the coolest guy I’d ever seen, started combing my hair like him. Never knew he was gay. Or Rock Hudson till he died of AIDS.’
Nadine gasped. ‘OMG—Bick Benedict was gay?’
Sam eyed her, apparently unsure if she was serious.
‘She’s been watching the movie at the Paisano,’ Book said.
‘Oh. Well, I’m afraid he was, little lady.’
‘Wow. I didn’t see that one coming.’
‘Anyway, Giant allowed us to forget our troubles for a few months. When they packed up and that train pulled out of town, it was like Marfa’s funeral procession. Population’s been dropping ever since. Kids get out of high school then out of town—last census, we were down to nineteen hundred and eighty-one souls living here full time. This place was damn near a ghost town. Last one to leave, turn out the lights.’
Sam removed the cap and scratched his head.
‘That was before Judd.’
Sam pointed at a photo of an older bearded man.
‘Donald Judd. Big-time artist up in New York City, decided to move his operation to Marfa in nineteen seventy-three. Wanted his art to be set in place permanently. “Installation art,” they call it. Judd bought vacant buildings on Highland—there were many to choose from—the Marfa National Bank Building, the Crews Hotel, the Safeway grocery store, the Wool and Mohair Building … renovated them into studios and galleries.’
‘We checked out the Chamberlain exhibit in the Wool and Mohair Building.’
Sam gestured with the toothpick. ‘I’m an open-minded sort of man. I’ve actually grown fond of Judd’s boxes, and I’m warming up to Flavin’s lights. But crushed car parts? That’s art?’
‘See?’ Nadine said to Book. ‘I’m not the only non-believer.’
‘Then Judd bought the fort. Three hundred forty acres. Turned the artillery sheds and barracks into galleries, put up outside art—sixty big concrete boxes, damnedest thing you’ve ever seen, right on the field where Patton played polo. He was an interesting man, Judd. Loved bagpipes. I don’t know why.’
‘You knew him? Personally?’
‘I did. Talked to him many times. Said he moved to Marfa because he hated the show business and commerce art had become in New York. Wanted to get away from that world. And if you want to get away from the world, by God, this is your place. From here to Hell Paso—thirty thousand square miles—there’s not but thirty thousand people. Judd kept to himself, and locals didn’t bother him—hell, no one knew who he was, or cared. He fell in love with this land, bought forty thousan
d acres south of town, called it Las Casas. He’s buried out there, died in ninety-four. Lymphoma. Place was still a ghost town when he died. No jobs, no celebrities, no businesses, the Paisano was shuttered, tourists came for the Marfa Lights not the art, and Highland Avenue was nothing but vacant storefronts except for Judd’s galleries.’
‘People weren’t coming to see his art?’
‘Judd shunned publicity like the Amish shun the modern world. He lived like a monk out there on his ranch, no electricity, no hot water, no people. Like I said, he came here to escape the world, not invite it in.’
‘What happened? The buildings on Highland aren’t vacant now.’
‘After Judd died, the mayor and other movers and shakers in town, people in the game—’
‘What game?’
‘The money game.’
‘And you don’t play that game?’
Sam Walker spread his arms to the small office.
‘My media empire. Professor, I publish this paper because the history of Marfa and the Big Bend needs to be recorded. I think that’s important. This isn’t a business to me—hell, I barely break even most months. I expect constitutional law means more to you than your paycheck.’
‘It does.’
‘The mayor asked me to join in, but I declined. I don’t make news, I just report it.’
‘Maybe I should meet the mayor.’
‘Just walk around town, he’ll find you. He can sniff out a celebrity like a bird dog on a hunt. Man was born kissing ass.’
‘You and the mayor enemies?’
‘Enemies? Nah. You want enemies, go to Houston or Dallas. Me and the mayor, we just look at the world from different angles. Anyway, him and those ol’ boys got together, decided to market the “Marfa concept,” they call it, the art, a way to put Marfa on the map. “Marfa myth” is what it is. But the national media bought it, descended on our little town, told the art world that this is the place to be. We don’t have a doctor, a dentist, a drug store, a movie theater, a McDonald’s, a Walmart—’
‘A Starbucks,’ Nadine said.
‘—but Marfa’s the place to be? I don’t get it. But everyone drank the Kool-Aid. Then the Triple As descended on us.’
‘The Triple As?’
‘Attorneys, artists, and assholes. That’s what the locals call them, the Triple As, outsiders who came to town to make Marfa their own. Attorneys came first, double-barreled rich, flying out here from Dallas and Houston in their private jets, acting like they had discovered Judd’s art, buying up old adobes and downtown buildings like they were buying lunch. Then the artists came, from New York, gays mostly, bit of a culture shock to cowboys.’
‘I told you,’ Nadine said.
‘We’re like L.A. now, except with artists instead of actors. Everyone making coffee, scooping ice cream, or waiting tables is an artist hoping to be discovered.’
‘In Marfa?’
‘Like an artist version of American Idol. They’re all young and hip and hate Bush, but bottom line, they’re all desperate to be as rich as Republicans and as famous as that Kardashian gal.’
‘Khloe?’ Nadine said.
‘No. The other one.’
‘Oh. Kim.’
‘They’re just passing through, like the trains. But they brought a little variety to town, opened these fancy restaurants serving French food and Italian cuisine, little place called Maiya’s—’
‘We walked past it. Red door, in the Brite Building.’
‘Gal from Rhode Island, she owns it. New Yorker came to town to design costumes for that movie There Will Be Blood, decided to stay, started a dry goods store. Others came and opened up more restaurants, galleries, jewelry shops, a bookstore, organic grocery store, coffee houses, live music bars, and that Ballroom Marfa, what they call a multimedia art space. Now, with Judd’s and Flavin’s and Chamberlain’s masterpieces installed here, they say Marfa’s the new art Mecca, so New York artsy types trek out here like they’re making some kind of religious pilgrimage.’
Sam seemed to reflect on his own words a moment.
‘Funny how things worked out. We were a ghost town of old ranchers, old-timers, old Mexicans, and old buildings, only two places to eat, but hell, you can’t eat but one place at a time. We were here because we belonged here. On this harsh, unforgiving land. Then Judd moved here because he didn’t belong in New York anymore. Twenty years, he made his art and his home here, became a bona fide Texan—I told him so the day he bought that ranch, that’s every Texan’s dream, to own a part of Texas. Now, twenty years after he died, the mayor and the Triple As have taken something real and made it something phony, turned this town into Santa Fe South or Marfa’s Vineyard, take your pick, and Judd’s art into the commerce and show business he hated. Marfa’s a goddamned art theme park, and we’re just running the rides for the tourists.’
Sam returned to Donald Judd’s photo.
‘Don wouldn’t want to live here now. All the New Yorkers followed him here—hell, we got more Yankees than cattle. Folks fly in for the weekend, pay two hundred thousand for adobes worth twenty ’cause they think they’re cute, then they triple the size and turn the places into walled compounds like they’re living in Guadalajara in fear of the cartels. Drove real-estate prices and taxes up and the locals out. What you call ironic, New York liberals who profess to care so much about the poor and Mexicans, but they’re buying third and fourth homes as trinkets and driving the poor and Mexicans out of Marfa. I tell them that, and they just smile and shrug their shoulders, as if it’s out of their control. Like the weather.’
Sam dug at his teeth with the toothpick.
‘Before the Triple As, this town was peaceful, hardly any conflict, just the normal stuff between the Anglos and the Mexicans—this is Texas—but basically everyone minded their own business and got along.’
‘Not now?’
‘Not hardly. Now we’ve got conflict. Hell, it’s a goddamned civil war. “New Marfa” versus “old Marfa.” Haves versus have-nots. Anglos versus Mexicans. Mexicans versus the Border Patrol. Artists versus cowboys. Homosexuals versus heterosexuals. And we’re all at odds with Mother Nature, trying to make a life in this desert. Now we’ve got the fights over fracking.’
Sam waved at a passer-by outside.
‘Is Mr. Barnett the only fracker in town?’
‘Far as I know. He’s the man in Marfa. Employs damn near everyone in town who ain’t a Border Patrol agent or an artist. Bought up leases, hired locals to work the rigs, and started punching holes. Pays good wages—some of those boys had been unemployed for years, all of a sudden they’re able to buy new pickups. Art made Marfa fashionable. Fracking made us profitable.’
‘So where’s the fight?’
‘Fights. Plural. We got the environmentalists and artists trying to stop the fracking ’cause they think it’s the end of the world, and we got the cattle ranchers fighting the pipeline easements. Can’t truck gas out like you can oil, so Billy Bob’s laying pipelines. If folks won’t sell—and they won’t—he’s condemning their land, which is apparently legal in Texas.’
‘It is.’
‘Hell of a law.’
‘Has Billy Bob filed condemnation suits?’
‘Yep.’
‘I assumed that didn’t make him any friends?’
‘Nope.’
‘So what’s your opinion of Mr. Barnett?’
‘My opinion? Fact is, he’s one of the assholes.’ Sam glanced at Nadine. ‘Pardon my French.’ Back to Book: ‘Out here, you don’t mess with a man’s land. It can be dangerous.’
Chapter 8
They had seen Marfa from the outside looking in; now they saw Marfa from the inside looking out. Standing in the cupola atop the three-story, Renaissance-revival-style Presidio County Courthouse that offered a 360-degree panorama of the Marfa Plateau, they could see the entirety of the town, all the way to the edges where civilization petered out into desert. The land beyond lay stark and yellow and bare of trees all
the way to the brown mountain ridges that framed the plateau.
‘I’m scared of heights.’
‘Ms. Honeywell, you’re only four stories up.’
‘I think I’m going to throw up.’
They walked back down the stairs to the district courtroom on the second floor. The courthouse had been built in 1886 for only $60,000, but the solitary courtroom was the grandest Book had ever seen, and he had seen a few. It had a ceiling twenty feet high, elaborate crown molding, and old-style seating with individual chairs secured to the wood floor. They sat and took in the space.
‘You let Mr. Walker go on and on about Marfa. Why didn’t you question him about fracking?’
‘Most folks get defensive when a lawyer interrogates them like a guilty defendant, Ms. Honeywell. They don’t open up. They shut down. So I’ve learned to listen. Everyone has a story to tell, and they want to tell it. We learned a lot from Sam Walker.’
‘We did?’
‘We did.’
‘I thought you wanted him to put a story in the paper?’
‘I do. And he will.’
Her eyebrows crunched down. ‘You say that as if you’ve done this before.’
‘I have.’
‘Why does that make me nervous?’
Book gestured at the grand courtroom that bespoke the history of West Texas.
‘So, Ms. Honeywell, what’s your career plan? To be a small-town lawyer and probate wills in a courtroom like this? Or a big-city lawyer?’
‘I don’t want to be a lawyer.’
Book turned to his intern. ‘Then why are you in law school?’
‘My dad didn’t have a son to take into his practice, so he’s making do with me.’
‘What do you want to be?’
‘A chef.’
‘A law student who wants to be a chef? That’s different.’
‘A law professor who rides a Harley? That’s different.’
If you want to sue over a contract, a car accident, or condemnation of land for a gas pipeline in Presidio County, you file a lawsuit in that courthouse. With the district clerk. Who smiled at Book.
